5 Frames with a Braun Super Paxette using Dragon No.1 film

I love old film cameras. It’s led me to build a small collection including a Kodak Retina IIIc (which I’m not a massive fan of), Voigtlander Vitomatic IIa (which I love), Voigtlander Vitessa A, Zeiss iKON Contina II and most recently a Braun Super Paxette.

It was on a visit to my local camera shop (always dangerous) when I first saw the Paxette sitting at the top of the glass ‘Used cameras’ display cabinet. As soon as I saw it I knew it was coming home with me.

For those who aren’t familiar with them it’s a very small full frame coupled rangefinder camera with a Prontor leaf shutter and interchangeable lenses. When I say very small it’s tiny. Barely any bigger than a Rollei 35. With the lens removed it comfortably fits in a pocket.

This particular example came with what is arguably the best lens option – the Schneider Kreuznach 50mm f/2.8 which I’ve used previously on the Retina (on a different mount).

The lens mounts on a 39mm thread but due to the leaf shutter the lens sits much further from the film plane than a Leica L39 (or LTM) lens. This mount is sometimes referred to as a B39 mount. Mounting an L39 lens will never get focus.

Fortunately there is a decent range of lenses from a number of manufacturers covering focal lengths from 35mm to 200mm.

The camera top plate contains the film advance lever, a cold shoe, the film rewind knob and the frame counter. The frame counter has to be set manually and is advanced to the correct position by pushing the serrated edge at the rear. The film advance is a two stroke affair which is ratcheted to allow partial strokes if desired. The advance also cocks the shutter, the release for which is on the right side of the lens. The film rewind knob freewheels until raised by a gentle pull upwards. Just to the left of the film advance lever is a tiny button to disconnect the transport  whilst rewinding the film. It must be pressed the entire time the film is rewound.

The rear of the camera has the tiniest viewfinder of any camera in my collection. This is the biggest flaw, especially for spectacle wearers. It’s near impossible to accurately frame a shot whilst wearing spectacles. There is also what looks to be some kind of adjustment screw which I’m guessing is for the rangefinder.

Underneath the camera is a large central knurled knob which once unscrewed allows the entire back and base of the to be removed to load film. Once the back is removed the film pressure plate (which is not removed) hinges out the way, a lever beneath the film canister swings out the way and film can be loaded. This is about as painless as it gets on vintage cameras.

On the front is the heavily buttressed lens mount and Prontor SVS shutter. Unlike the Retina the aperture control and focusing helicoid removes with the lens. This brings up another flaw in the ergonomics of the Paxette. The arrangement of controls goes (from the camera side) shutter, focusing then aperture. When focusing care must be taken to use the scalloped focusing ring instead of grabbing the smaller aperture ring, especially if making final adjustments on focus before shooting. It’s very easy to change the aperture inadvertently. Above the lens there are the two windows for the viewfinder/rangefinder.

There is no light meter.

Overall the camera feels very sturdy and is surprisingly heavy, especially given it’s diminutive size.

So overall it’s quite quirky and charming but what’s it like to use?

Well aside from the issues already mentioned  the only thing to be careful of is not to trip the shutter inadvertently. It’s very easy to do given it’s location.

Image quality was surprisingly good. In fact it actually surprised me but you be the judge.

The film used here is Dragon No.1 100 ASA shot at box speed though the distributor says it can be used at 25-320 ASA. This is hand spooled in the UK from rolls imported from Ukraine. It was the first time I’ve used Dragon No.1 but I’m very pleased with the results and can see I’ll use it again.

All images were taken at Goodwood Revival 2025.

This camera is a joy to use even if the really tiny viewfinder makes framing difficult while wearing spectacles!

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